The Geneva Challenge 2019 – Challenges of Global Health

The Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies is pleased to announce the 2019 edition of the Geneva Challenge – Advancing Development Goals International Contest for Graduate Students. This year, students are invited to develop analysis-based proposals on “The Challenges of Global Health”.

The 2019 edition of the Geneva Challenge is a project funded by Swiss Ambassador Jenö Staehelin and was supported by the late Kofi Annan, as high-patron of the contest. The Geneva Challenge aims to encourage interdisciplinary problem solving analysis among master students on advancing human development within the scope of a relevant topic.

Global Health is a defining challenge of tomorrow’s world and is a critical concern for both developing and developed countries. As the key to this issue is an interdisciplinary solution, crossing traditional boundaries between academic disciplines, we are inviting master students from all academic programmes to provide helpful strategic recommendations. Five prizes, one per continent, we will be distributed.

Teams of 3-5 master students must submit an 8,000 word proposal which:

identify a challenge stemming from global health;

construct an interdisciplinary analysis on how it affects different aspects of development in a specific (but transposable) context;

propose innovation at the policy, practice, process or technology levels turning the challenge into development opportunity.

The Geneva Challenge 2019 will distribute 25’000 CHF in monetary prizes and the finalists will be invited to publicly present their work in Geneva before a panel of high-level experts. Networking opportunities are also envisioned as part of the prize package.

In 2018, 336 teams made of 1’284 graduate students from 101 different nationalities, registered. The competition received 66 inspired submissions on the Challenges of Climate Change. The first prize of 10’000 CHF was awarded to the team from North America from the University of Columbia. They propose to map and analyse the changes in migration patterns, seasonality, and urban and agricultural development using data from satellites, mobile telecommunications, and GPS- enabled systems.

We believe that this opportunity could be of interest to your students and that their participation would contribute to the quality of our pool of submissions. Thus, we would appreciate if you could promote the 2019 Geneva Challenge among your students.

Registrations close on 24th March 2019.Submission due by 15th July 2019.